Pages

Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Fancy Flowers Tutorial

I love making new hair accessories for my girls, and occasionally for myself. I don't really wear flowers in my hair because I feel a little juvenile, but these might be the exception for me. These look like they are really hard to make, but really it's just the opposite. ANYONE could make these. Seriously!

Let's get started and I'll show you what I mean.

Supplies:

*Poly Satin fabric
*Lighter
*Scissors
*Hot glue gun

First, you need to cut a strip of fabric. It doesn't need to be perfectly straight, in fact I think it works out better when it's not straight. POST EDIT The fabric strip size is about 58 inches by 3 1/2-4 inches. (If you just take a piece of fabric straight from the bolt, it is folded in half. The length of the fabric once it is un-folded is the 58 inches.)

Next, you will fold the fabric in half. I then sew a basting stitch down the entire strip. If you don't have a sewing machine, you could also do this by hand and just sew a running stitch.

Once it's sewed, you are going to cut scallops. These don't need to be perfect either. It is nice to get varying sizes and curve shapes to add to the texture of the flower.

This next part is the most fun. You take your lighter and seal off all the edges of the scallops. If you just run the flame along the edges, it will seal it and make the scallop curl a little giving it a more "petal like" look.

Once your edges are all sealed, you will need to gather the fabric. You do this by pulling the fabric along one of your threads moving the gathering along the fabric as you go. When it looks the way you would like it to look, just make sure all of your gathering is consistent along the entire strip.

I started wrapping my gathered strip in a circle so that it began to form the flower. Once the flower was formed, that is when I secured it. I tried doing both the hot glue way and hand sewing it. Both ways turn out nice, so you can't go wrong. All you do is, after your flower is formed, hot glue the bottom to a piece of felt. I put the clip on the flower at the same time and it seemed to work well.

I attached the clip a little differently on this flower. Both ways work fine.

When the felt is glued, I clip the felt into a circle which makes it look a little nicer.

And ta-da! You finished! These would be so fun to wear on a necklace, in your hair, on a lapel, anything!

It is so fun that they can be customized to any color you want! Plus you can make a ton since they are really inexpensive and easy to make! Bonus.

I hope you have some fun making these yourself! Also, this week is the Point of View reveal, so be sure to check back on Friday so that you can link up your fun Summer/ Vacation projects!

Oh my goodness... last week I had made the traditional burning edge flower (with the layer of circles).. and the other day a random thought came to mind.. I wondered if anyone has every done the same technique but with scalloped edges instead! I never got around to doing a search but came across your flowers today at a linky party.... boy was I excited to see them! I really wouldn't have known how to exactly go about it so your tutorial came at a perfect timing!! Your flowers are gorgeous!! Thanks for sharing them with us:)